Airbus A320 Crashes in Alps
- Thread starter SS-89
- Start date
Soldato
- Joined
- 1 Apr 2009
- Posts
- 9,952
No different from an ******* with a gun. Granted, these aren't usually the commercial pilot types. I wonder if their recruitment and training standards have dropped so low as to allow the slightly more mentally unstable to join in. A lot of pressure, a lot of hours, a lot of competition, complicated aircrafts, the pay I hear isn't so great, it is not the fighter pilot retirement plan it once was.
Permabanned
- Joined
- 28 Dec 2009
- Posts
- 13,052
- Location
- london
I was thinking about a solution to prevent this and as it is human caused the only solution i can think of is some kind of AI that detects problematic path and takes over, gives control over to a remote third party and basically flies itself, with just a human overseer. They do say that they fly themselves these days. They would just need a bypass for emergencies, something that couldn't be overridden and lead to a crash like this and something that wouldn't cause problems in an emergency.
Permabanned
- Joined
- 20 Nov 2011
- Posts
- 3,814
- Location
- Cambridge/Chicago
A pilot life is worth something, that's essentially millions in talent and investment into an individual.
Who cares if a civvy dies? More business to life insurance companies.
Plane is worth more than all people on it... Fit plane with a parachute, maybe some will make it.
The problem with that would be that the computers don't have the ability to recognise that the pilot might be doing something "odd" for the right reasons.
IIRC one of the Airbus crashes back when the first of the modern autopilot/fly by wire systems was in use was because the Pilot was doing an airshow manoeuvre (something that was safe) but the computer decided was wrong and the pilot couldn't over ride it.
Another near crash was averted because the pilot was able to treat a jet like a glider.
You also run into the problem that the pilot might be aware that there is something wrong with the flight computer or automatic instrumentation, but the computer disagrees with him, and anyone controlling it remotely will either have to:
Agree with the flight computer (good bye aircraft if the instrumentation is at fault), or if they're able to contact the pilot and believe him you're in the same situation as now (if the pilot is lying, good bye aircraft).
Other crashes have been caused by valves malfunctioning, but the computers didn't know that - IIRC in those instances the only thing that saved one of them was the pilots doing something that went against what the computer would have expected.
You'd also be introducing another area of possible mistakes or faults, and possibly worse, a way for the aircraft to be remotely controlled by a malicious third party who the pilot couldn't over ride.
This completely ignores the fact that if the pilot is in the aircraft they pretty much have to have access to the ability to shut down virtually any system in it, otherwise you run into the potential situation where a fire happens because the pilot couldn't shut down power when there was a short (and if they can do that, they can shut down power to the over ride system, or simply everything).
About the best way to prevent a pilot crashing the aircraft on purpose is to make sure that there is always a second person in the cockpit, fairly simple, cheap and easy to implement...
IIRC one of the Airbus crashes back when the first of the modern autopilot/fly by wire systems was in use was because the Pilot was doing an airshow manoeuvre (something that was safe) but the computer decided was wrong and the pilot couldn't over ride it.
Another near crash was averted because the pilot was able to treat a jet like a glider.
You also run into the problem that the pilot might be aware that there is something wrong with the flight computer or automatic instrumentation, but the computer disagrees with him, and anyone controlling it remotely will either have to:
Agree with the flight computer (good bye aircraft if the instrumentation is at fault), or if they're able to contact the pilot and believe him you're in the same situation as now (if the pilot is lying, good bye aircraft).
Other crashes have been caused by valves malfunctioning, but the computers didn't know that - IIRC in those instances the only thing that saved one of them was the pilots doing something that went against what the computer would have expected.
You'd also be introducing another area of possible mistakes or faults, and possibly worse, a way for the aircraft to be remotely controlled by a malicious third party who the pilot couldn't over ride.
This completely ignores the fact that if the pilot is in the aircraft they pretty much have to have access to the ability to shut down virtually any system in it, otherwise you run into the potential situation where a fire happens because the pilot couldn't shut down power when there was a short (and if they can do that, they can shut down power to the over ride system, or simply everything).
About the best way to prevent a pilot crashing the aircraft on purpose is to make sure that there is always a second person in the cockpit, fairly simple, cheap and easy to implement...
no it was because the pilot flew 70ft lower than he was meant to which meant he was below the tree line.
the aircraft functioned as expected.
iirc the pilot went to prison.
what all 7+ ?
Last edited:
Which all rely on the same sensors, plenty of crashes and near crashes, where computers have performed on the data they have, just the dates totally wrong.
It's not rare for speed data to be totally wrong due to ice. which means it does not matter how many computers you have.
which generally the computer bunts control back to the pilot completely.
which as with the airfrance plane on the way to Brazil proved that isnt exactly safe either as the pilot immediately put the plane into a stall and crashed it into the ground.
Soldato
- Joined
- 2 Mar 2004
- Posts
- 11,919
- Location
- SE England
Not necessarily. I believe at least one airline has lost an airplane due to the failure of at least one fly-by-wire system that wasn't working properly. They finally shut it off, I believe (pulled the breaker for it), but inadvertently stalled the aircraft just after and didn't have the altitude to recover.
got a source for that?
and surely thats still pilot stalling the plane once the computer isnt there to stop him stalling the plane.
Soldato
- Joined
- 2 Mar 2004
- Posts
- 11,919
- Location
- SE England
I think it was this one. No doubt there have been others, too.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Indonesia_AirAsia_Flight_8501
I think you still need to have pilots in the cockpit, one way or another. Computers might be smart but they can't react in what might be the right way to odd failures. I have no doubt that a pilot could keep an airplane flying in a state where it probably shouldn't, when under computer control it'd simply fall out of the sky –*like complete hydraulic systems failure, and then flying the plane purely on differential thrust alone. Plus computers can't necessarily respond to any other external influcences or problems.
it seems that once again pilots are no longer trained to fly without the computer stopping them doing something fatal.
thats just like the airfrance one, computer control removed, pilot pulls back hard on the stick used to the computer turning that input into the max safe nose up and fatally stalls the aircraft.
Sky news saying that video footage from a mobile phone has been recovered showing the last moments before the impact. Passengers screaming and complete chaos apparently 
I was only reading yesterday on avherald about the possibility of SD cards etc surviving the impact and wondering whether people filmed what was going on.
I was only reading yesterday on avherald about the possibility of SD cards etc surviving the impact and wondering whether people filmed what was going on.
Soldato
- Joined
- 22 Oct 2004
- Posts
- 9,086
- Location
- Berkland
How long till that is on Live Leak... 
How long till that is on Live Leak...
I don't ever want to see that video, it'll be even more horrific than the ISIS beheading ones and i won't sleep for days
